Stranded Deep
by DragonRing
Summary: Bill Harris's life, that of a fortunate and prosperous businessman, is suddenly turned completely upside down when a plane crash leaves him stranded on a lonely island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Confronted with all the dangers of the open sea, he must relearn what was long lost to him by the luxuries of modern life, the rawest and most primitive instincts of humankind.


Prologue

''How much longer are we going to discuss this, Bill?'' Martha's voice echoed through the speaker into my already hurting ear. ''I told you how I feel about this, and I don't approve of it, but you just won't listen to me!''

I sighed loudly so that she'd hear it through my Smartphone, and passed a hand over my shaven head. ''I do listen to you, sweetheart, but this is what Junior wants.''

''It's not what he wants, and don't you dare call me sweetheart!''

I puffed out another loud sigh. ''I really don't know what your problem is. It's time Junior gets a living, develops interests, ambitions, and he'll be best prepared with me at the head office. He'll meet big people that'll be his stepping stones to a prosperous life, and-''

''Have you actually ever listened to anyone but yourself, Bill? It's as if you don't even know him, your own son! He's been working in a body shop with Francis as of late, and enjoyed himself enormously.''

''Gosh, is he still dating that good-for-nothing idiot?! As if accepting that one's own son is gay isn't enough! He could at least choose someone with a higher IQ than that spectacle-moron!''

''You shut up, Bill! I'm not signing it!''

''But, Martha...''

''No, I won't let him waste away his life in an office chair with a receiver glued to his ear!''

I did as if I hadn't heard her last reply. ''Listen, I gotta go, we'll talk when I get off this flying death-trap, okay?''

''No we won't, Bill!''

''Love you?''

''Never again!'' Beep.

Grunting out as yet another, more violent turbulence shook the small private airplane around me harshly, I set the phone on the table next to my open laptop, where the message icon just popped to life. Tokyo asked if I was having a good flight, and I told them I had had better ones.

''Can I offer you a drink, Mr. Harris?'' Annabel the blonde stewardess asked from the aisle.

''A Martini, and this time don't forget to light it.'' I answered absent-mindedly while checking my emails. I was alone on this God-forsaken plane, except for the two pilots, the stewardess and my bodyguard, Tom. He was napping in his heavy black suit opposite me, the sunglasses he had donned while in San Francisco still clinging to his temples, and I didn't understand how he could possibly sleep while the plane jumped and roared as if it had secretly nicked all my Martini bottles. It was raining heavily outside, a storm which transformed the Pacific briefly into a first-class rollercoaster ride. This wasn't the first time that I made this trip to faraway Nippon with this very plane, but it was the first time that the pilot let the propeller spin so fast. We were running out of time because a moron had threatened to blow up one of the airliners out of whatever protest at the airport, and for over three hours no plane was to take to the sky before being thoroughly checked inside out. The private pelican I was sitting in had also had an engine problem at the start, but thanks to my personal favourite engineer it had been fixed within only two more hours. And checking my waterproof wristwatch, I let out a stressed sigh when I saw that the exhibition in Tokyo I had been invited to attend would be officially commenced in a little less than five hours.

''Here's your Martini, sir.'' Annabel said with her botox grin while handing me the glass. The alcohol was still steaming slightly.

''Thanks, Anna.'' I downed the drink in one go, feeling the red hot liquid cleave its way down my throat. I munched on the olive, my focus back on the emails, and welcomed the sensation of peace overcome my stomach as the Martini made a home in its fleshy walls. Everything will go according to plan, I told myself. It was a mystery, true it was, but somehow I'd always been fortunate when it came to business. FutureTech was my life, my everything, the ambition of making progress where no one expected it in the slightest. From the simplest electric housework-gadgets to building Nanobots for medicinal purposes only, I brought luxury and a higher standard of life into every family's home. The rich more than the poor, obviously, but my new series of EcoBots provided quality mechanical service at a ridiculously low price so that everyone could share in the fun. The Japanese were very interested, prepared to run a head-to-head race with China to win over my partnership, and it seemed that every check number I asked would be written out by the secretary. They were crawling at my feet, begging for my attention, and I enjoyed myself greatly.

Martha had barely dulled this exaltation, because she was blind to the absolute power I had over people. I had hoped that at least my son - God spare him for being gay - would share my enthusiasm, but I could not push him towards his luck forever. One day, I thought with another sigh, one day you'll be sorry for not listening to your dad, William Junior, and then you'll come crawling on your hands and knees, just like the Japanese and Chinese, and beg me to give you another chance. And then we'll rule FutureTech together, as father and son, and Martha will cry lonely tears into her pillow at night and be sorry for ever having left her generous husband.

The Martini wobbled around in my guts as the plane jumped high, and the phone fell off the table.

''Can't you be more careful, idiots?!'' I roared at the two pilots at the front of the aisle, gripping the seatbelt around my thighs tightly so as not to meet the same hard fate than my phone. Tom's head jerked awake with a loud snore, his fingers picking at his glasses to show his lifting eyebrows.

''Still in the air?'' he asked sleepily and looked out of the window into the black of night.

''I'm seriously doubting that this dumb-ass ever had a flying lesson in his life.'' I responded while checking if my expensive phone had any damage. At the front, the propeller was making loud coughing noises, probably the rain immersing an ignition cable or something.

''At this rate we'll never make it.'' Tom said and leaned back to resume his nap.

''You said it, Tom, you said it.''

And then it came. The propeller gave a sudden bang as something fleshy and featherly collided with its shearing blades, and Annabel gave a frightened cry from the trolley bar at the front. The pilot roared something at his assistant while tugging madly at the pitch-lever, but the engine drowned out his voice as a deafening crash sent bits of machinery fly into the air.

''What the Hell!'' I screamed out upon feeling the entire plane lean down, rooting my back to the seat. Tom looked at me with wide eyes, but he was propelled forward violently, his head hitting the table hard as the pelican pulled him down. His blood flew into my face in red sprinkles from a fatal head wound. Annabel was still shrieking where she tried to hold herself in the doorway to the passenger compartment, and I could see her terrorized face contort in horror as the plane finally fell, headlong, towards the Pacific.

I couldn't move. My seatbelt tightened around my waist, bits and pieces of rubbish flew at me from the front, a Martini bottle barely missed me, but Annabel's lighter lodged itself right between my teeth. Instinctively I bit down on the Zippo, forming a mark in its stainless steel. Tom's lifeless body threatened multiple times to crush me under its death weight, and only his seatbelt kept him at bay. On the other side of the aisle, a turbine exploded, shattering the glass of a window into billions of shards. I closed my eyes just in time ere the rain of glass pelted my face, the Zippo cracking in my mouth.

Annabel's screeches stopped abruptly as the bird dove into the sea, my seatbelt ripped, and all became black around me.

I was awakened by the desperate urge to breathe. My eyes clapped open, and I found myself in salty water. I roared out a bubbling scream and paddled frantically towards a red shimmering spot right above me, soon breaking through and gulping down a hard breath. The turbines whistled deafeningly around me, and I felt my air pocket become smaller by the second. The plane was sinking!

I didn't have time to panic. Clutching the Zippo in my hand, I swam to the broken window opposite me, but it wasn't wide enough for me to squeeze through. I breathed hard the vanishing air, turned around desperately to find another exit, but all I could see was the passenger's compartment becoming smaller and smaller. Something black swam past me onto which I threw myself, and realized it was my backpack that sank the moment it had to carry my weight as well.

I was submerged, but then I saw something in the clear water. The exploding turbine had not only ripped the window to pieces but also a big portion of the plane's side near the prow. I dove for it as fast as I could, the lighter in one hand and the backpack in the other, and was momentarily stunned as something floated past me. A manicured hand was in my way, belonging to the blonde Annabel convulsing with drowning spasms, and I flinched back with another frightened scream. The exit was behind me, and I swam for it as fast as I could. The hand briefly brushed my foot, trying to hold me back, but I only swam faster and finally emerged outside the plane.

Fire all around me! The water burned from a layer of propellant swimming on top. I was surrounded by flames and debris, with only something round, yellow as company. I turned to the strange floating thing and found out in panicked relief that it was a life raft, probably dislodged from the front aisle and swimming like a pancake on the ocean. I paddled over to it, tried to find the ripcord that would inflate it for me, and was thrown back into the water as its sides suddenly bulged with air. The backpack came free of my hand underwater, I tried frantically to catch it with my foot. It settled down on my shoelaces, giving me time to throw the Zippo into the life raft. The pack came next, and after a few frustrating tries that almost tipped the raft over, I found myself on its squashy bottom as well.

The turbine! I suddenly thought in horror. Still spinning and whistling right in front of me in a desperate attempt to heave the crashed plane back into the sky where it belonged, it did only as much as suck my raft nearer and nearer. I looked around for something to counter the pulling force the boat was exposed to, and was proved yet another time that luck was part of my life as I saw a paddle attached to the rubber sides of the life boat. Panting heavily, I paddled as fast as I could away from the turbine.

But it wouldn't let me go like this. With a final, deafening explosion, the pelican hurled its last energy at me to make sure I'd remember it; the machine that had turned against me.

Struck by the crushing wave of the explosion, I was thrown over, my ears ringing me into a deep unconsciousness.

000

 _ **Author's note:** Stranded Deep is a PC survival game with incredibly astounding graphics that let you feel as if you're right there in the game. I wanted to write this for a long time now, not only because I'm fascinated by the general theme of _survival _, but also because this game is one of the most beautiful I've ever played and inspires me immensely. You only have to look at a sunrise in the game, and you know what I'm talking about :)_

 _I'm a total nut at this game, mostly because I'm afraid of ocean depths, ship wrecks and sharks, but it pushed me to overcome my fears, making me bolder every time I play it. Okay, I haven't managed to kill a shark yet before it killed me, but I'm working on it xD_

 _This is also the first time I'm writing a story that is talking_ _in the first person and which_ _doesn't play in the Middle Ages and Renaissance like my Legend of Zelda novelization, so it is a pleasant challenge to take up._

 _I named the poor man William ''Bill'' Harris only because I like the sound of it, so every real-life connection to a man named Bill Harris is purely coincidental. FutureTech is also fictional, and the same applies to it as above. All rights are reserved to the makers of Stranded Deep._

 _I'd be delighted to hear what you think of it, and if I should continue this one next to my other stories. Just leave a review and tell me your thoughts!_

 _See you soon!_

 _DragonRing_


End file.
